A long pass went out and a football sailed through the air. Down field, a small, wiry player ran deep. He leaped high with perfect timing, caught the ball and went for the touchdown.

“Oh yeah! Oh yeah!” Joey chanted. “Touchdown!”

“Ok, don’t go crazy,” called Skyler. “It’s just the two of us.”

Joey stopped his victory dance and hustled back to his friend. The two boys sat down on the grass. Skyler plucked a blade of grass and started chewing on it. Joey lay down and looked up the fluffy white clouds floating by in the blue sky. Further away from their playing field were sounds of traffic, splashes from the near by swimming pool, and kids on the playground rounded out the summer afternoon.

“Hey Skyler, are you ready for school to start tomorrow?”

“Are you kidding? More like starting jail. Seventh grade is going to be hard!”

“Maybe. But we’ll get to play football this year.”

“That’s the only good thing about school.”

“My dad says Mr. Rains is a tough coach. Makes you run lots of wind sprints.”

There was a pause. A horn from a car honked and there was a squeal of tires. Both boys jumped to their feet, listened, but wasn't any crashing sound. Joey picked up the football and they started walking towards the swimming pool.

“Skyler, I had a crazy dream last night.”

“Yeah, what was it?”

“It was about us and football practice and I was doing everything wrong. And I was getting sort of mad, when this guy came over to me and started talking to me and helping me.”

“Yeah, what’s so crazy about that?”

“Oh, nothing, but it was the guy, who he was.”

“Like, was it Peyton Manning?” Skyler stopped walking, his face bright with anticipation.

“No, not Peyton. It was Jesus,” Joey said softly.

Sklyer looked at his friend. “Jesus?”

“Yeah. It was kind of strange…cause, you know, I never figure He’d know anything about football and stuff.”

They reached a park bench where there was a good view of the swimming pool and sat down. Joey began tossing the football up and down.

“Well, it makes sense,” Skyler finally said.

“What?”

“Your dream. That Jesus helped you. I know I ask Him to help me be a better player. And at church camp we learned to thank Jesus every day, all day if we’d really think about it and, yeah,” Sklyer nodded his head.

“My mom says Jesus is everywhere. So why shouldn’t He be with us and help us with something like football?” Joey added.

“Might sound goofy and stuff, but that makes me feel better.” Skyler jumped up, snatched the football and took off running. “Joey, let’s go practice some more, want to?”

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I liked the beginning of the story. “Okay, don’t go crazy… It’s just the two of us.” This was also a cute line and realistic from a twelve-year olds perspective: “I never figured He’d know anything about football and stuff.” The story also concludes well with the boys returning to their game of football.